This invention relates to steam irons, and, more particularly to steam irons adapted for use with an external water/steam reservoir.
Steam irons that are connected to a large capacity, external water or steam reservoir by a flexible hose are known in the art. The reservoir may provide the iron with either water or steam, the latter being generated by a heater associated with the external reservoir. This arrangement permits a large capacity reservoir that is particularly useful in lengthy ironing sessions. Unlike standard irons with incorporated internal water reservoirs, the person using this iron does not have to fill the reservoir several times while ironing.
In spite of the advantages of such external reservoir irons, they are also inconvenient in that they are cumbersome and difficult to implement. Moreover, external reservoirs adapted to supplying steam to the iron must be heated quite a long time because of their large water storage capacity.
The above mentioned drawbacks are also a problem to a user wanting to iron only a single garment in a short period. The time it takes to implement an external reservoir iron is thus disproportionate to a very brief period of use.
Some irons are known, notably those described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,316,907, U.S. Pat. No. 3,130,507, and DE 2,800,767, which have an internal reservoir connected to an external supply. In these irons, however, the external supply replenishes only water to the internal reservoir. At best, this kind of arrangement is not suited to different kinds of ironing. Indeed, when an external supply is used, the vapor pressure of the supply is limited by the presence of the reservoir and drip regulation devices which, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,316,907, connect the reservoir to the vaporization chamber. Furthermore, the internal reservoir, located in the path connecting the external reservoir to the vaporization chamber, is not adapted to an external steam supply.
On the contrary, if, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,130,507, the internal reservoir is joined to the vaporization chamber by an injection device, such as a valve that is adapted to a highly-pressurized, large discharge water supply, the injection device is not adapted to the use of the internal reservoir alone because it cannot accommodate injection of water only by gravity feed.